1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to an RF connector assembly which may be used for millimeter waves and which can be mounted to a printed circuit board. A further aspect of the invention is a transmission line, which may be used to connect an RF connector to a printed circuit board. The transmission line is based on a band conductor.
2. Description of Relevant Art
A RF connector assembly is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,607,400 B1. A connector is mounted into a cutout of a printed circuit board. The electrical contact is established by soldering pads to a ground plane and to a signal line. Due to their design, such connectors are only suitable for frequencies up to order of magnitude of 1 GHz.
A millimeter wave connector for interconnecting a microstrip circuit and an external circuit is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,669,805. The connector is held in a housing, which also contains a microstrip substrate to be connected to the connector. During assembly, the flexible center conductor of the connector has to be bent to adapt to the microstrip circuit. Bending of the center conductor may cause asymmetries, which degrade the electrical characteristics of the connector.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,797,765 discloses a coaxial connector for mounting on a circuit substrate. The connector is soldered under a right angle to the surface of a substrate. For contacting the center conductor, a bond wire is used. Therefore, assembly of this connector requires complex special machines for bonding.